The Holocaust Research Paper

Organizing the Holocaust was complex. Not only Hitler but also many Germans and non-Germans contributed to annihilating the Jews from Germany. In addition to the Nazi government and military, many doctors, lawyers, judges, and “ordinary” people played a role in persecuting the Jews. German Jews were patriotic to Germany. Many had died for their country in WWI, and countless others had been wounded and received medals. They were honored for their valor. But that all changed when Hitler came into power, and the Nazi Party came up with the “Final Solution”, the plan to murder the Jews in Germany and eventually, in all of Europe and the rest of the world. On April 1, 1933 the Nazis proclaimed a boycott against Jewish shops, businesses, and professional services. This legal onslaught was divided into three stages. At first a law was passed which aimed at preventing Jews from taking part in the professional and cultural life of the Germans. Jews were to be left out of and forbidden to attend social activities. The second stage was the passing of the Nuremburg Laws which defined Jews in racial terms according to the number of Jewish grandparents a person had. All Jews had to be registered in a certain way: name, age, gender, address. Jews were only allowed to receive as much food as the rest of the population could spare, but not any more than was required for their bare subsistence. It also stripped Jews of their citizenship. The third section placed all Jewish communities under the direct authority of the Gestapo (Security Police). All Jews were required to register their property and possessions. Jews were forbidden to change places of residence without permission. Any and all valuables owned by Jews were to be turned over to the Nazis. On April 7, 1933, the Nazis passed the first anti-Jew law—the Restoration of Professional Service Act. Jews could no longer work as doctor or dentists in state-run hospitals. They were also forbidden to be judges, jurors, tax consultants, publishers, or editors. On April 25, 1933, a law against the Overcrowding of German Schools and Institutions of Higher Learning was issued. On May 21, 1935, a Defense Law was passed; no Jew could serve in the military. German Jews who had served in WWI were demoralized by this law (Landau 127). There was a high rate of suicide among those veterans during the first two years of Hitler’s reign. Later that year Theodor Fritsh wrote “The Racists’ Ten Commandments” for the Nazis (Landau 128). OfÏcially, all Germans had a common enemy----the Jew. No interactions of any kind were permitted between Germans and Jews. Otherwise, the Germans’ minds would be poisoned. Oddly enough, no violence was allowed against Jews because they were unworthy of it. But if a Jew attacked a German, he would be arrested. In October 1938, thousands of Jews of Polish origin who lived in Germany were expelled. They were taken to the Polish border but were refused entry by its government. So the Germans set up several makeshift camps on the borders of Poland and Germany for those Jews. Every camp was organized identically. Their only purpose was to kill the prisoners---there was no possibility of surviving. Among the Jews in the makeshift camps was a couple by the name of Grynszpan. Their son Herschl was studying in Paris. When he found out about his parents, he went to the German Embassy in 1938, and shot Ernst von Rath, the Third Secretary. The Nazi hierarchy had been waiting for an incident of this sort. Without consulting his colleagues, Joseph Goebbels, German politician and Reich Minister of Propaganda, used this ‘foul’ murder of a loyal German as a just cause for punishing the Jews (Landau 142). On November 9-10, 1938, anti-Jews roamed the streets of Germany with violence in mind. They burned synagogues, shops, warehouses, etc., and beat and murdered innocent Jews. That day, 91 Jews were killed, and 7,000+ Jewish-owned shops and synagogues were destroyed and burned to the ground. The Nazis were impressed by this act of hatred. They called it ‘Kristallnacht’ (The Night of Shattered Glass). But never again did Germany show such open violence to the Jews (Landau 143). Shortly after Kristallnacht 25,000 Jews were arrested and sent to concentration camps at Sachenhausen, Buchenwald, and Dachau in Germany. On January 30, 1939, Adolf Hitler gave a speech to the German Parliament about the Jews. He talked about how the rest of the world would not take the Jews, despite their being so sympathetic toward them. Hitler spoke about how the Jews were parasites living on the body and productive work of other nations. He told how he had often been a prophet, but the Jews had laughed at his prophecies. One prophecy had been that he would take over the leadership of the state and that he would settle the Jewish problem once and for all. Lastly, Hitler said, “Today I will once more be a prophet: If the international Jewish financiers in and outside Europe should succeed in plunging the nation once more into a world war, then the result will not be the Bolshevization of the earth, but the annihilation of the Jewish race from Europe.” (Landau 147). Not many people took his speech literally (Landau 147). Some thought he said it to frighten the Jews (Landau 147). This argument had already been put forth by several scholars several years before Hitler’s plunge into power (Landau 147). Not even Hitler himself knew how or when he would put his threat into action (Landau 147). On March 15, 1939, German troops marched into Prague, Czechoslovakia, and established the German Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. Because Czechoslovakia was now under German control, tens of thousands of Jewish Czechoslovakians were exposed and destined for a horrible fate. In November 1939, all Jews were ordered to wear a white armband with a yellow Star of David symbol. All Jewish men were forced to adopt the extra name: Israel. And all Jewish women had to add the name Sarah into their name. This was so they would be easier to identify. Hermann Göring, second-in-command to Hitler, gave these instructions to Reinhardt Heydrich, General of The Gestapo, on July 31, 1941: “I hereby commission you to carry out all the necessary preparations with regard to the organizational, substantive, and financial viewpoints for a total solution of the Jewish question in the German sphere of influence in Europe. I further commission you to submit to me promptly an overall plan showing the preliminary organizational, substantive, and financial measures for the execution of the intended final solution (Endlosung) of the Jewish question.” (Landau 166). Heydrich was given responsibility for the control over the murder of millions. Jews were killed often and without any care by some Germans who supported the Nazi Party in September 1943 (Katz 421). Many Jewish ghettos were destroyed in 1943 as well because they were considered centers of corruption and revolt. From 1933 to 1945 the Nazis established about 20,000 camps: forced labor camps, transit camps which served as temporary stations along the way to a destination, and extermination camps. In October 1941, the first deportation of German, Austrian, and Czechoslovakian Jews was sent to the concentration camps of Riga and Kovno which were in territory captured from the Soviet Union. There were six death camps, concentration camps (places for confining enemies of a nation) with special apparatus specifically designed for murder: Chelmno, Belzec, Sobibor, Majdanek, and Treblinka, Auschwitz. All of them were located in Poland. Chelmno was the first death camp. Between 194143 over 200,000 Polish Jews and 10,000+ Soviet prisoners and Gypsies were murdered in its gas chambers. Belzec was the second death camp. 500,000 Jews were exterminated by carbon monoxide between March 1942 and May 1943. At Sobibor, the third death camp, 250,000 Jews were killed in gas chambers disguised as showers from May 1942 through October 1943. During 1942-43, 130,000 Jews died at Majdanek, which was near the city of Lublin, Poland. 800,000 Jews, mostly from Warsaw, were killed at Treblinka from July 1942 to August 1943. Rudolf Höss was appointed the commander of Auschwitz on May 4, 1940, whose construction began in the summer of 1941, under Henrich Himmler’s orders (head of the Schutzstaffel (SS)). Auschwitz, located in Upper Silesia, Poland, was a death camp of considerable size and importance. It was split into three sections: Auschwitz I (‘normal’ concentration camp), Auschwitz II (the most ambitious and extensive of all death camps), and Auschwitz III (a huge labor camp). In no other Nazi concentration camp were so many people killed as in Auschwitz. Auschwitz was in an easily isolated and camouflaged area. The swampy region was afÒicted with malaria, and the buildings were in a dilapidated state. Because Auschwitz was in such bad condition, the Jews were forced to rebuild their own prison. The camp was surrounded by warning signs, concrete walls, watchtowers, and double-depth, electrified, barbed-wire fences that were illuminated at night. The slogan “Arbeit Macht Frei” (Work Makes You Free) was placed above the camp entrance. A typical camp was organized along this model: the prisoners lived in wretched conditions in the many concentration camps. All prisoners were given a number when they arrived at a camp which from that point on replaced their name. As soon as they stepped off the trains, they were undressed, and both their heads and their bodies were shaved. Then they were given new clothes: striped suits made of coarse canvas. It was thin for the summer and thicker but barely warmer for the winter. The prisoners also received heavy, wooden shoes. They were allowed to write letters occasionally, but they were required to always include this one sentence: “I am healthy, I am fine.” The letters were also deeply censored. The camp directors were extremely strict and found fault with the smallest of mistakes. “Offenses” were the simplest of things: missing buttons, unsuitable facial expressions, sloppily washed bowls, etc. The prisoners were subject to many penalties: beatings, fatigues, and detentions. Sometimes prisoners were hung from posts with their arms raised and tied behind their backs as punishment for innocent mistakes. Or they were given strict detention which was solitary imprisonment in the darkness of cells where they could only stand. During this confinement, which usually lasted several weeks or more, the prisoners were only given stale bread and water. When they were taken to the gas chambers after this horrible treatment, they were beaten the entire way. The place for gassing the Jews was a farmstead in the northwest corner of what would become the third building sector at Auschwitz III. The farmstead was isolated by woods and was not far from a railroad. Gassing was the most frequently used method because shooting was “too heavy a burden” on S.S. men, especially because of the women and children (Katz 352). But many of the Jews were shot anyway. The bodies of the dead were placed in long, deep pits dug in nearby meadows. In several of the concentrations camps, Jews were used for experiments. They were injected with chemicals by doctors. The chemicals injected into the Jews harmed them later. At Auschwitz twins were tested for scientific reasons because doctors wanted to see which twin was stronger, etc. Many children were deported from their homes in the ghettos for these treatments. The Holocaust involved the deliberate murder of approximately six million Jews in the Nazi domination of Europe from 1933-1945. But Hitler did not completely expose to the Germans the full extent of his hatred toward the Jews. Many Germans did not know what truly happened in the camps because the Nazis made films of Jews enjoying life in the “safety” of the camps. Some did not even know that there were such places as death/concentration camps. For a time, educators, historians, etc., could find little to say about the Holocaust because they thought it was disrespectful. But now, although the reverence still exists, there is no longer silence. Elie Wiesel, a Jewish-American professor/author and a Holocaust survivor, said, “The Holocaust defies literature...we think we are describing an event, but we transmit only its reflection. No one has the right to speak for the dead…still, the story had to be told. In spite of all its risks, all possible misunderstandings, it needed to be told for the sake of our children.” (Landau 3). The Holocaust of the Nazi era is regarded as one of the most heartrending events of modern history, if not of all human experience.